There will be a special BOD meeting immediately preceding the Eastside Get-Together on Thursday, April 19. The meeting will begin at 7:30pm. All 4D members are invited to attend this meeting. The purpose of the meeting will be to discuss 4D’s possible co-sponsorship of the Narrow Gauge Convention in September. Representatives from the convention will be on hand to answer questions.
This coming Thursday (April 5) there is a big church supper scheduled, so our regular meeting room will be unavailable.
We are going to use the “Fireplace Room” instead. You enter by going up the the main entrance stairs from the parking lot. Then turn left once you are inside. This change is for the April 5 meeting only.
So, if you get to the meeting and find it crowded with lots of new people, lots of food, and no trains; you are in the wrong room.
The Olympia Model Railroad Layout Tour is scheduled for Saturday, April 14th. Nine layouts will be open to visitors, including:
This is your chance to see a variety of layouts in various scale/gauge combinations representing a wide variety of prototypical interests. A few of the layouts are in the early stages of construction, but all are operational. As with previous years, a few of the layouts will be open early, while a few will stay open later, so visitors may see as many as possible.
If you are interested in visiting, please contact me at sbuckley54@comcast.net and I will send you an email with layout descriptions, hours of operation, layout addresses, and a map. Those of you who have already contacted don’t need to do so again. I will beginning sending this info beginning next Saturday.
Please note: this is a semi-invitational event. While we want to make the tour available to as many interested people as possible, for security reasons we can’t allow maps to our homes to get out to those with ulterior motives. Please feel free to bring friends and family members. You may also forward this message to people who you personally know.
Please come join us this Thursday (April 5) when our clinic topic will be scratch building turnouts in N scale. The basic techniques are applicable to all scales, so if you can build them in N you can build them in any size. If you have seen Stu R’s turnouts before, then you know these make for good looking track. Stu will be showing us how he does it.
If you were there last month, when he showed us how he uses Cadrail, then you might have gotten a hint of how Stu starts the turnout process. Cadrail can do a lot more than just pretty, scale layout drawings. But, before we talk about some of those other things, here’s what I took away from the demo of layout drawing:
And here are some other things Stu showed us can be done by Cadrail:
John B brought in some photos of the small logging layout he is building, so we could see what he is doing. It was interesting to see his paper mock-ups of a sawmill and some buildings; also to see some of the buildings under construction.
Dennis T brought an Olympia Beer plug door reefer and a Sante Fe ballast car, both in N scale. He had acquired these on a vacation trip to San Diego. He also had an On3 flanger which he had just cleaned up after getting it some time ago at a clinic mart.
Here are a couple of pictures of the dioramas David C brought to the February clinic and that I wrote about last month:
Feb Clinic – Dioramas from David C
Feb Clinic - Diorama by David C
Feb Clinic - Diorama by David C
We meet at the Ronald United Methodist Church, 17839 Aurora Avenue North, Shoreline, WA. That is on the west side of Aurora (State Route 99) between 175th and 185th Streets and more specifically, between the Cadillac dealer on the south and Deseret Industries to the north. You can no longer make cross-traffic turns on Aurora, so you need to be going southbound (so you can make a right-hand turn into the church driveway immediately after passing the Deseret location).
Meetings are the first Thursday of each month, except July and August. In June we usually do a tour. For regular meetings enter the lower level of the church from the parking lot at the rear. Doors open around 7:00 PM and the program starts about 7:30.
Remember the next meeting is April 5 and the one after that is May 3. Hope to see you there or at least sometime on down the line.
The Northwest Railway Museum invites mothers of all ages to enjoy a free ride aboard our antique train, when accompanied by a paying child of any age. Passengers may board in Snoqualmie or North Bend for the 70-minute round trip. Passengers may get off at the halfway point, shop, eat lunch, or take a stroll and then return on any later train. Trains depart every 75 minutes beginning at 11:01 AM from the Snoqualmie Depot at 38625 SE King Street and at 11:31 AM from the North Bend Depot at 205 McClellan Street. Roundtrip fares are $10 (children 2-12), $15 (children 13-61), and $12 (children 62+). For more information, visit www.trainmuseum.org or call 425-888-3030.
National Train Day returns to the Snoqualmie Depot on May 12. Enjoy a dose of history while celebrating Mom. See historic Snoqualmie on a beautiful May day, visit the restored 1890 Snoqualmie Depot, ride a vintage train past the top of Snoqualmie Falls and celebrate all things train. It’s Amtrak’s 41st anniversary and a great day to celebrate!
Visitors to the museum experience the excitement of a working railroad while learning about the important role railroads played in shaping the character of the Pacific Northwest. The depot and bookstore are open to the public 10–5 daily.
No, this doesn’t mean that model railroaders can now get into exclusive nightclubs! We’ve dropped non-working email addresses from our lists.
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Just a reminder that the election for NMRA National offices is currently under way. Your ballot can be found in the February issue of the NMRA Magazine. Ballots must be postmarked by April 10, 2012 for delivery to the NMRA no later than April 15th. In our neck of the woods, we are voting for President, Vice President – Administration, Vice President – Special Projects and At-Large North American Director.
On Thursday, March 15th, JJ Johnston got the train out of the station on time at 7:30 with his words of welcome and introduction of guests. One of our guests was Sharon Ricketts, who models in 1:32 scale and holds two open houses a year at her layout. The next open house will be the 4th Saturday of April, so JJ may have more information on this at the April meeting. We also welcomed back Don & Beth McClaren, long-time Eastside members who have returned after a lengthy absence.
During the announcements, Charles Jackson stated that H&J (the tree making people) are having a roll out party at a hobby shop in Port Moody, BC and to see their brochure. There is no information about the roll out on their website, but you could probably email Charles to get the information.
Other announcements included reminders by Ed Liesse and Russ Segner about upcoming conventions (joint PNR/PCR and the Narrow Gauge Convention respectively), an open house on April 29th at John White’s layout (extreme north end), and a word about the upcoming elections by Superintendent Ken Liesse. Roger Ferris was present with the Mart and CJ Riley also had some items for sale from his vast collection.
Model of the Month consisted of two Milwaukee Road cabooses by Ron Cole; a collage of paperwork from Bob Rorabaugh’s mother showing a connection between her life and the trains and logging in this region; and a Campbell Products station built by David Yadock, who once again went home with the prize.
After the break, Ron Cole presented a clinic on how to cast resin parts for modeling. Ron makes 1:32 scale models. He walked us through the steps of transforming an idea into a passenger coach complete with seats. Some of the tricks Ron employs are using baby powder as a mold release and heating molds in a microwave oven before using them. Ron also mentioned that you can rebend a slightly warped resin kit by running it under hot water and gently bending it back into shape. He makes mold boxes out of PVC sheet, which is relatively inexpensive and can be glued together with the PVC pipe glue you can find in any hardware store. For a final tip, Ron told us that molds will last longer if you get the resin out of them as soon as possible. Ron demonstrated the mixing of the resin and actually cast a part for us to see. All in all, a very interesting presentation.
See you on April 19 in Bellevue.
We have a volunteer who has stepped forward to handle the ballots for this year’s election. A big hand to Di Voss for taking on this role.
Deadlines for nominations for this year’s ballot is Sunday, April 1st. We have two open positions: Superintendent and one Director. We also have two candidates for each office. If you would like to nominate someone or self-nominate, please make sure you have a short candidate statement to Di (davoss@pvmtengr.com) before next Sunday.
There will also be a ballot measure to approve a revision to the 4D By-Laws. These revisions (which amount to a complete makeover) can be found on the 4D website under the Members Only section. Please take the time to read them and vote when you receive your ballot.
This month clinic was opened by Al Babinsky filling in for MMR Gene Swanson who was still out due to his knee replacement surgery. The clinic was held at the Parkland fire station due to a scheduling conflict at our normal location. There were 36 modelers including a newcomer in attendance. Chip from the TNW made an announcement about their car that would on sale at their upcoming show on May 19 and 20. It was also announced that there would be a Spring Model Show in Renton.
Bill Deutscher from Tacoma Trains was a no-show and we did not have a What’s New at the Hobby Shop. Since Herb Buhl was in the hospital we had to ad lip the Model of the Month segment. The models were assigned numbers and slips of paper were passed out to all present with the instructions to write the number of their model of choice on the slip and their name on the other side for the door prize drawing.
After the break Steve Young presented his continuing clinic of progress on the construction of the narrow gauge live steam Northern. He brought the three axle tender truck along with axles, wheels, and the roll of spring steel for the springs. He showed us how the truck was constructed and how the springs would be mounted. Steve will be back next year with another segment of the ongoing construction.
For the first time that I can remember we had a draw in the model of the month category. Dennis Reeve and Diane Krause tied with their models. Dennis had a set of kit-bashed N-scale log trucks and Diane a Farm silo and shed. After the door prize drawing the clinic was adjourned. Next month clinic will be on April 12 at our usual place in the Pierce County Library Admin. Bldg. on the corner of 112th Street and Waller road, hope to see all of you there.